SANITARY ARRANGEMENTS IN DUNEDIN.

Evening Star, Issue 3837, 11 June 1875, Page 3

SANITARY ARRANGEMENTS IN DUNEDIN.

To the Editor. SIK, —On 6 of the most essentially ntoessary things to do at the present time! is to organise an efficient health department: in Dunedin, so that all nuisances injurious to health may be removed or abated. Geperally .speaking, Colonial sanitary laws are made by the lawyers, who make a few verbal alterations in an English Act of Parliament, and hbve it (enacted "by the Colonial Legislature. The result is that the law, when it cotnes intd* operation, is found to be absolutely unworkable in the Colonies. This was the case in Trinidad when I was appointed to take charge of the sanitary department. I found that the law was practically a dead letter, and that any attempt .to enforce its provisions only ended in a failure. After much hard fighting I got' a new Ordinance passed, which, though not all I could have wished, worked tolerably well. By it the whole Colony was placed under the| charge of a medical officer of health, who had under him a Sanitary Inspector for each of the towns,' and the wardens were. made ex officio Sanitary Inspectors for the rural districts. The Colony contained a population of about 120,000, of whom there were 23,000 in Port of Spain, the capital, and between 5,000 and 6,000 in the next largest town. The then Governor (Sir A. Gordon,' K.C.M.G.) gve me carte blanche in the organisation of the department, and as the arrangements stood the test of two severe epidemics it may be useful if 1 state what they were.

In Port of Spain I had, besides the Sanitary Inspector, two sub-inspectors, a clerk, and a messenger. The Sanitary Inspector issued all orders, tdok out summonses for breaches of the law, supervised the sab-inspectors, and attended the Magistrate’s Court when cases were being heard. The town was divided into two districts—one to each sub-inspector. These djatricti.were again subdivided into six subdistricts, and the sub-inspectors were required thoroughly to inspect one sub-district every day. The whole town was thus inspected once a week. They had books in which there were columns for every street, block, and section ; and inevery section they were required to report in the proper column the state of the premises, yards, water supply, drains, closets, &c. They had to report to. me every morning the state of the sub-district visited the previous day, and the Sanitary Inspector visited every place when a nuisance was reported, and judged whether any legal. proceedings should be taken or not. Th; removal of all obvious nuisances was .required to ,be‘effected within twenty-four hours, over-crowded houses could, • during an epideimdj be closed and evacuated within the wpe, tjjjse. For the erection or formation of structural works, such as drains, closets, &c., a-time Was allowed varying according to the necessities of the case and the means of the owner*. - If they were too poor tu afford the necessary outlay, the work was done by the Health Department, and the money repaid by instalments ; the debt being due to the Queen, it was a just charge on the property. WhensmalT-pox became epidemic, the town was divided into eight districts, to each of which a medical officer was appointed to vacci»ate, hod to attend the small-pox cases. The number of sub-inspectors was correspondingly augmented,, one being appointed to each district,; and the Senior Sub-Inspector was made AssistaUt Sanitary Inspector. The sub-inspec-tors were required to visit every house in their districts duly (Sundays included), and report every fresh ease of small-pox to the medical rations and medioaJ comJorts to the sick on the order of the medical-officers, attend to the disinfection of ale-houses in which there were small pox cases, and provide for the immediate bunal of the dead. - The dead were buried generally within four hours after death.; All clothes and bedding used by the sick were burned during the early days of the epidemic,

and the owners compensated by the Government,: imt as the oases increased this became so ■ enormously expensive that'it had to be given up. Afterwards! the epidemic spread with much greater rapidity. Where proper attendance- oeuld not -be given to the sick-in their own houses, or if their friends wished their removal, they were sent to the Small-pox Hospital. The’sanitary department had charge of the whoW jpfjj the Arrangements' for medical attendance, relief, and burial, arid I may say that the system worked'welL The only tiring was tlw# WBiiriould not provide hospital accoinmodationiquicklyenough, as nobody would' who small-pox. We had over 5,000 cases iri ,Hj6rt of Spain, and I believe about 11,60(3 m'dre in the other parts of the. Colony. When ! fiisttook office Port of Spain was as foul and filthy as any town in the West Indies, and when I resigned there was rio town in England that I have inspected so free- from nuisances. Of course, the drainage was defective, and only a £third of the town was sewered, but what are ordinarily termed nuisances, there were hardly any. This was, effected by unceasing vigilance, and by enforcing.the law wherever it could be enforced. One thing I impressed on my Sanitary Inspectors, and that was-never to take out a' summons in a doubtful case. By this means-las we always' got judgment iri our favor - the people began to think that they had against us, that it was hopeless to resist, and that they must do what was conyicted, and have costs to pay of‘hills, budt chiefly of¥odd; and divided into blocks and sections. Every hotee had printed ori it the number of the block and section on which

it stood,|thus—“ B. 111,, S. 27.” I believe if a similar system were adopted in Dunedin it would work well.—l am, &c., _ R. H. Bakewell, M.D. Dunedin, June 10.